


Alone - But Not Like I Used To Be

by TheLittleGirlFromSokovia



Series: Stranger Things Imagines [3]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/F, F/M, First Kiss, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:48:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21572497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLittleGirlFromSokovia/pseuds/TheLittleGirlFromSokovia
Summary: Everything was different with Max. El knew that much. And she liked different. And it looked like Max did too.
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper/Maxine "Max" Mayfield, Eleven | Jane Hopper/Mike Wheeler, Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair
Series: Stranger Things Imagines [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1528253
Comments: 7
Kudos: 63





	Alone - But Not Like I Used To Be

Everything was different with Max.

El didn’t like Max at first. She thought Max was trying to take her best friend away from her. So she responded in one of the only ways she knew how. Violence. She knocked Max off her skateboard. She didn’t really know Max, though. And even when she did, she didn’t. She was _acquainted_ with Max. Max was in their friend group now, and El tolerated it. She never gave her a chance, really.

Until she did.

* * * * *

Apparently, when you like someone very much, as El did Mike, you kiss them. El was okay with kissing Mike. He was nice. He was her friend. She was not really sure what a “boyfriend” was, but she was okay with him being hers. And when he started ignoring her, and _lying_ to her, El didn’t know where to go. She knew that friends were not supposed to lie, so why was Mike lying to her? And if he was, was he good enough to be her boyfriend? She couldn’t just let herself fall into another trap. She couldn’t go to Will or Lucas. Dustin was nowhere to be found. So, she went to the only place where she knew someone might help her.

She went to Max Mayfield’s house.

Max was surprised to see her, at the very least. She had just fallen off her skateboard, and cursed, frustrated. She looked up only to see Eleven, the super powered girlfriend of Mike Wheeler, kick her skateboard into her hands. She was dressed shabbily, her hair tucked behind each of her ears. Max wasn’t sure how to react. Just take her skateboard and thank her? Awkward. Why was she here anyway? Max searched in Eleven’s eyes for the answer, and she just might have found it. Eleven was frowning. Sad. She held Max’s skateboard tenderly, as if she just wanted to put it down and collapse. Max knew this look, this attitude. Knew it well.

Boyfriend trouble.

* * * * 

Max had walked up to Eleven, hesitantly spoke the word “Hi?” With a questioning tone, because she wasn’t sure what to say to Eleven – they hadn’t ever really spoken to each other – without the company of the rest of their party - before. They were awkward at first. Max invited her inside, for she was home alone. Max brought Eleven to her room, and sat her down.

  
“So…what happened with Mike?”

“How did you know this was about Mike?”

“I can tell. It sucks. I know it… _very well._ ”  
  
“Yes. It does…suck.”

“Well?”

“Friends don’t lie. Mike…he lies. Why does he lie? ”

“Friends may not lie, but boyfriends lie. All. The. Time.”

“But why?”

“It’s just what they do.”

“But why don’t girlfriends lie? I do not lie.”

Max frowned. She did lie…about some things. About how she kept breaking up with Lucas brazenly telling herself that she would do it this time. Tell him that she didn’t want to get back together again. That she didn’t like him like that. That other…people she found attractive. That she liked. And yeah, maybe they tuck their short hair too far behind both of their ears, and wear shabby men’s clothes. But…it wasn’t Max’s fault. She couldn’t help that she…maybe…kinda…sort of… had a crush on Eleven? It was weird. Max was _not_ supposed to find girls attractive.

_And especially not Eleven._

Then Eleven spoke,

“Why do girls date boys then?”

Max forged on in this conversation she _really_ would rather not be having with Eleven.

“I…I don’t know. And I think everyone lies.”  
  


“Everyone?”

  
“At one point or another? Definitely.”

Eleven’s shoulders sagged as Max emphasized the word definitely. Max felt bad for hurting her feelings; Eleven was way too innocent for this world. She literally knew _nothing_. Such bliss, Max thought. Everything that could corrupt someone, Eleven didn’t have, care, or know about. Money, drugs, romance. I mean, she was dating Mike, but Max had a feeling that Eleven still didn’t fully understand that either. Regardless, Max took Eleven to the mall.

* * * * *

After the day at the mall, Max and Eleven (now called El) enjoyed their ice cream as they left.

Max had enjoyed this whole day more than she had enjoyed anything in…well, a while. Her stepfather had made sure of that. He barred her from most things, as he did Billy. Billy had used to team up with Max – take her for ice cream, to the arcade. But…he changed when they moved. He became more obsessed with himself – how he looked, how he acted. And Max might have damaged his new rep…so, of course, she had to go. She still loved Billy. He just made it very hard to love him.

Max had reveled in the day, mostly because of how much time she got to spend with El. Every hand touch, every awkward or unexpected question (Why is it so…bright?). When they got the ice cream, El let Max trade cones with her. Max licked the ice cream, swearing she could taste a hint of El’s mint in the strawberry.

Then they ran into the idiots.

Mike of course, freaked out about El being outside. Max swore that Mike thought he was the only one who cared about Eleven. He could be so…irritating at times. Despite that, she didn’t completely hate him. But she disliked him enough to edge El into breaking up with him. As soon as El spoke those words, Max’s heart soared. Like she said, she didn’t hate Mike. That’s it! Max thought. She didn’t hate Mike. She hated that El was _with Mike._ Trying to ignore the feelings growing inside her damaged heart was becoming harder with every passing day. Scratch that. Not with every passing day.

Every moment she spent with El.

When she was alone, she could try, _try,_ to forget El. And for a while, she could. Lucas was a distraction. But, when she was with her, El, was when her feelings became unbearably adamant to escape. When she was alone, she could try to wipe each quick touch, each lingering stare, from her mind. She could convince herself that she had romanticized all her time with El, and that El knew nothing of it at all. But, when she was with her, with El, her bouncing curls and annoyingly pure heart made it impossible for Max not to fall in love with her.

Max zoned back in to find El pulling her to the bus. Of course, after saying those glorious words to Mike.

“I dump your ass.”

* * * * *

El had seemed exhilarated after dropping Mike, but Max could tell that she wasn’t the same El that she was a few minutes ago. Regardless, they finished their ice cream cones on the bus, and found their way back to Max’s house.

They ended up doing and talking about what they knew to be pointless things, but Max knew that El didn’t want to think about what she’d done with Mike. Max didn’t want to think about Lucas either. How he kept coming back to her every time she pushed him away. How much she wished she could tell him that she loved someone else.

She pushed the thought away.

El seemed to be getting more and more restless and uncomfortable as the night wore on, so Max called it a night and they laid down in Max’s bed. Honestly, it was usually Max who was uncomfortable yet exhilarated in this position, but tonight El just wasn’t herself. Max turned the light out, listening to El’s breathing. Letting it calm her.

But Max couldn’t stop thinking. She couldn’t sleep. She just couldn’t. She listened to El’s breathing slow. El rolled over, fast asleep, and draped her arm across Max’s torso, so that she was spooning her from behind. Max felt more content than she….ever had. But she hated that this would never happen when El was awake. That El loved stupid Mike Wheeler.

That El would never, could never, and should never, love her back.

It was all too much. To have something, but not really have it.

Max slipped out of El’s arms, and slunk to the floor. The tears started to fall, but Max didn’t want to wake El. Let El see her like this. Have to explain to her why she was crying. So Max threw her yellow raincoat over her tank top and boxer shorts, put on her sneakers, grabbed her skateboard, and ran outside.

She set the skateboard on the sidewalk, ready to run away. Like she always had. Run away from her problems, her family, and now El. She was ready for that, she thought. To just leave everything behind. To find a new place without her complicated life and problems. But then, she thought, she would just find new problems, and a new place to hate. Was there anywhere safe for Max Mayfield, then? More tears fell as Max readied herself to kick off her skateboard.

That was when Max heard the footsteps and yawn from behind her.

Shit, Max thought. If it’s her mother, she’s screwed. If it’s Billy, double screwed. If it’s Neil…she didn’t even know. And the funny thing was…least of all she wanted it to be El, because if it happened to be El, she had no idea what she would do.

It was El.

Her hair part was squiggly, and her curls fell into her face. She wore one of Max’s shirts, and a pair of her boxer shorts. She rubbed her eye with a balled fist, confusion spread across her face.

“Why do you leave?”

Max hesitated, and shook her head. She turned around, and El dropped her balled fist to her side, coming closer.

“And why do you cry?”

Max couldn’t really think of anything, really.

“I’m not crying.”  
  
Nice one, Mayfield.

“Yes you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

  
  
“But Max –“

“Will you just shut up Eleven?!”

Max yelled shut up. At El. Using her full name. Max felt so much like Neil it hurt. And she didn’t even know why she was letting all her anger out. Now. At one in the morning. In front of El. But she had already started down this road, might as well finish it.

“Look, I know you have no idea why I’m upset. You have no idea why I hate watching you obsess over Mike. You have no idea why I hate lying next to you in the same bed. And you probably never would, if it weren’t for my poorly time mental breakdown right now.”

El looked confused still, cocking her head.

“It’s because I like the way your curly hair bounces when you laugh. How you eat your ice cream, and share it with me. How you don’t care what popular girls think of you. How you don’t care what people think of me, what my family thinks of me. I like _you_ El. And you…you can’t like me back. So I’m leaving. For the sake of my sanity.”

Max picked up her skateboard and walked away, tears falling like raindrops from her eyes.

“Max.”

Max stopped walking. She almost kept going, until she heard El walking briskly up behind her, saying,

“ _You_ do not get to tell me what _I_ feel.”

El grabbed Max’s left shoulder, spinning her around. She put her hands on Max’s cheeks, pulling her face to hers, causing their lips to meet.

Max dropped her skateboard, causing El to pull her face back. Not far, but just enough to make Max want to punch herself for dropping it.

“So,” Max breathed.  
  


“So,” El added a little giggle, which scared Max into thinking this was all a joke. Until,

“I like you, Max.”

Max breathed out, letting all her disappointments, fears, and doubts out with the old air.

“Yeah?”

“Is that okay?”  
  


“That’s…more than okay.”  
  


El still had her hand on Max’s cheek, and stroked her thumb across Max’s face.

“Are you still going to leave?”

  
  
“…no. Not anymore. If you’ll stay?”  
  


“Always.”

El pulled Max’s face close to hers, kissing her again. Max wasn’t sure she would be able to breathe again, not after this.

“Back to sleep, then?”

El asked Max as she pulled away.

“Yeah. I’m sorry for waking you up.”

  
  
El might’ve looked at Max with the most not-like-El face ever, with her eyebrows up and mouth twitched up with a smirk.

“But I got to kiss you. So, I do not mind at all.”

Max laughed, and El laughed with her. El took Max’s hand and interlaced their fingers.

“And you are a better kisser than Mike.”

Max laughed again as they walked slowly up to the house.

“Max?”  
  


El asked as Max was about to open the door.

“Yeah El?”

“Will you be my girlfriend now?”  
  


Max wasn’t sure what to say. Did she want to be El’s girlfriend? Um, duh. But this world…El didn’t yet understand how complicated things would be.

“El, I would love to be your girlfriend. I would. But…that would make things complicated for you and me, and Mike and - ”

  
  
El pulled Max in for a third kiss, kissing her softer than she had before. When she pulled back, El said,

“I am okay with complicated, Max. But can I be your girlfriend?”  
  


Max was amazed, yet again, with how amazing Eleven was.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course.”

“That makes me happy.”

They walked inside, El’s head on Max’s shoulder, and Max had never felt less alone.

And she didn’t even mind that she had left her skateboard on the sidewalk.  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Just some soft Elmax, hope you liked it :)


End file.
